Newsmaker: Natie Kirsh - Billionaire who caused all the fuss

Natie Kirsh denies playing DA-Agang matchmaker, but says he has a plan to help wayward leaders

Who would have thought that an 82-year-old former South African with 95% of his business interests overseas could become such a divisive figure in the country's politics?

And yet, Natie Kirsh, arguably South Africa's most successful global investor, has been the subject of bitter insults and furious press releases from groups such as the South African Communist Party and the ANC Youth League.

They named him as the funder of the "failed marriage" between Helen Zille's Democratic Alliance and Mamphela Ramphele's Agang SA. The SACP referred to Kirsh as "a pioneer of global capitalist puppetry" - whatever that is supposed to mean.

What is true is that Kirsh has always preferred to operate below the radar, with astounding success. With business interests spanning the US, Australia, Europe and Southern Africa, Kirsh was ranked the 437th richest person in the world last year by Forbes magazine with personal wealth of $3.1-billion (about R34-billion).

Bloomberg's Billionaires Index ranked him even higher, putting his wealth at $5.1-billion.

Speaking to Business Times, Kirsh said he provided a "marginal amount" of funding to both the DA and Agang SA - an associate of his referred to it as "tea and biscuit money" - but denied bringing the parties together.

"I believe there's got to be an opposition to the government, but I wasn't involved in the marriage," he said. "Power corrupts if there are no constraints on anyone. It's the same reason I supported the ANC against the previous government because I thought it was essential to have an opposition.

"When Mamphela [Ramphele] came to me, she represented what could be good, credible opposition and I gave her some money. When Helen Zille came to me, she had already shown her ability to put things together and the [Western] Cape runs perhaps better than any of the other provinces," said Kirsh.

Zille and Ramphele announced early in February that the short-lived plan to join forces, and for Ramphele to stand as the DA's presidential candidate, was over.

At the time, Ramphele was quoted as saying "a donor pushed the DA and Agang SA together". Zille accused Ramphele of "reneging" on commitments she had made.

Kirsh is also close to Glynnis Breytenbach, a former deputy director in the National Prosecuting Authority whom he got to know when she was working on a case more than a decade ago in which someone had defrauded him. He said he admired her hugely for taking on the political establishment.

Breytenbach, who resigned in January to join the DA and stand as an MP in the coming elections, had a stormy time in the NPA after being suspended in April 2012.

She accused her bosses of acting against her because she was determined to pursue a case of possible fraud against police crime intelligence boss Richard Mdluli.

Kirsh and the De Klerk Foundation helped to pay Breytenbach's legal costs when she successfully applied to the Supreme Court of Appeals to set aside her suspension.

Kirsh, who spends much of his time in the US and Europe, said he cared deeply about developments in South Africa, including what he called the "gradual chipping away" at the rule of law.

"In South Africa, we see the destruction of the rule of law in terms of an attack on how judges are approved. There is an attack on the freedom of the press where you can't criticise the government," he said, referring to the Protection of State Information Bill.

"There is an attack on the police service by the removal of the Scorpions and appointing inappropriate people to the NPA."

What does Kirsh believe is motivating these measures?

"I came to the simple conclusion that it's fear - fear that some will be prosecuted if the rule of law prevails," he said. "So if you remove the threat of prosecution, this will allow the restoration of the rule of law. When this happens, it will also be the first step towards containing the increasing incidence of corruption throughout the country."

This would attract badly needed foreign investment.

To this end, Kirsh said he had approached leading figures in the ANC with a highly unusual and potentially controversial idea: to lobby for a "blanket amnesty" for people in power that would allow them to relinquish office without fear of being jailed for anything they did wrong during their term.

That amnesty would also have constraints: anyone who got it, for example, would not be able to appoint key figures such as judges.

The implication in the rambling statements from the SACP and ANC Youth League was that Kirsh had some undisclosed "agenda" in providing cash to the DA and Agang SA. But he rejects this.

"What is my South African agenda? I have no agenda. Look at the dynamics - I have three children who live in New York, nine grandchildren who live in America.

"My business interests are 95% outside of South Africa. In Southern Africa I'm very involved in Swaziland, where I have businesses and do a lot of charity work. For the rest, my business is around the world."

Born in South Africa, Kirsh built his first business empire in Swaziland and is now a citizen of that country. Although he is clearly not popular with the ANC's alliance partner, the SACP, he is full of praise for the ruling party's "remarkable progress" over the past 20 years and the "astonishing" way in which South Africa became a democratic country without bloodshed.

Kirsh has remained relatively anonymous in South Africa at least partly because he prefers investing in unlisted companies.

It was not always so. At one stage, he controlled 12% of Tradegro, which was the largest trading entity in South Africa some years ago. Tradegro at the time controlled the wholesale and retail sales of Checkers, Metro Cash, Dions, Russells and the JD Group.

He also tries to steer clear of the spotlight while continuing to work at the sort of frantic pace that would shame many people half his age.

Clearly, he does not have to keep working, so why does he?

Kirsh answered that he did not actually "work".

"I enjoy what I do ... it's creative."

So which business does he love best? "The one I'm best at ... I'm a student of business - it's like second nature."

Richer than the Swazi king

One of the facts that strikes you immediately when browsing the rich lists is that even though Natie Kirsh was born in South Africa, he is always listed as a Swaziland citizen.

Needless to say, his wealth, estimated at between $3.1-billion (R33.4-billion) and $5.1-billion, makes him easily Swaziland's richest man - even richer than the country's absolute monarch, King Mswati III, who is said to have a fortune of $200-million.

It is in Swaziland that he built his first business empire and developed a reputation for philanthropy.

In the small country, Kirsh provided start-up capital for more than 11000 small businesses and financed a project to make the country's high school graduates the first in Africa to be computer literate. (His low-key office in Johannesburg's ultra-rich suburb of Hyde Park has several framed letters from children in Swaziland who have written and sent pictures thanking him for his help.)

Kirsh was born in South Africa, but moved to Swaziland in 1959. He chaired the country's Electricity Board, built its first power stations and still has a thriving industrial business there.

In 1969, he moved back to South Africa, expanding Kirsh Industries to wholesale food distribution, supermarkets and commercial property development.

Then, at the age of 54, a deal between Kirsh Industries and Sanlam turned sour - and Kirsh packed up and moved to the US.

"I wasn't a pauper, but the big South African monster was gone," he said.

Now he moves between homes in London, New York and Swaziland. He visits Johannesburg and Cape Town more to catch up socially than to do business.

But he remains close to Swaziland, so much so that he was the attaché for the Swazi Olympic team in London. Chuckling, he describes the scenario walking into the Olympic Stadium at the opening of the Games with the team of three athletes - one swimmer and two runners - as well as the chairman and the flag carrier.

One of the things the ANC Youth League highlighted in recent press statements as supposed evidence of Kirsh's "ulterior motives" was that he is the biggest shareholder in Magal Security Systems in Israel, a company the league says is "complicit in the construction of Israel's Illegal Apartheid Wall".

But what the league did not say was that Magal is the world's leading perimeter-security company, which Kirsh bought in 1976 when he started Jetro in the US.

Magal operates in 75 countries around the world. It does borders for Israel and perimeter security for Buckingham Palace.

The startling success of Jetro in the US is perhaps the biggest untold story in Kirsh's business career. Jetro Holdings, of which he still owns 63%, is the largest food cash-and-carry wholesaling business in the US. It sends 5000 trucks into 93 restaurant depots and 10 Jetro Cash & Carry warehouses every day. Although it is a private company, estimates are that it made revenues of $7.5-billion last year.

This sort of success has not gone unnoticed by the Chinese, whose government recently asked Kirsh to set up a food wholesaling business in that country. It is a plan still on the back burner, even though Kirsh is at an age when many would have retired.